Charlie Oliver Jr. killed his 8-year-old cousin last July in the room the two shared, culminating what his family described as a six-year emotional spiral.
But the grace of victim Solomon Zellner’s mother may have helped convince prosecutors to reduce charges against the now 17-year-old Oliver.
“I don’t want to see him lose his whole life,” Angela Ramos, Solomon’s mother, said of Oliver. “He’s still a child, himself.”
Oliver was charged as an adult with felony murder and aggravated assault in the fatal shooting of his cousin. His initial hearings were closed because he was a minor.
On his 17th birthday in October, Oliver was deemed an adult and moved from the DeKalb County juvenile detention center, where he attended school, to the DeKalb jail.
“He wishes he was back [in juvenile],” Oliver’s grandmother, Jeann Ross, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “To him, being in jail is wasting time.”
Oliver will be in court Monday for a pre-trial hearing.
While Ramos said she is still mourning Solomon’s death, she expressed compassion for the teen she took into her home a year before the accident, and now the DeKalb District Attorney’s Office is considering lesser charges, prosecutors told the AJC.
“They did ask my opinion, and I think it’s OK,” Ramos said. “I just think he was being careless.”
Ross said she wasn’t surprised by Ramos’ attitude.
“She was crazy about Charlie,” Ross said. “And Charlie was crazy about her son.”
Oliver had a history of misbehavior dating back to elementary school, she said. When he faced being kicked out of Westlake High School in Fulton County, Ramos took him in, hoping to give him a fresh start at a DeKalb County school.
Oliver was 16 on July 6 when he and Solomon were playing in Ramos’ home.
The teen told police he saw Solomon’s 2-year-old sister Avery coming into the bedroom and he was attempting to put away the 0.9 mm automatic handgun he had, according to a DeKalb County police incident report.
It is unclear how Oliver got the gun.
Oliver told police his finger caught on the trigger and the gun fired, striking Solomon in the cheek. He died of his injuries at a nearby hospital.
“It was an accident,” Oliver told reporters as he was escorted from the DeKalb County Police Department after the shooting.
Ramos’ friend Jillian Squires said Solomon’s death broke his mother’s heart.
“She was devastated,” Squires said. “She couldn’t eat or sleep. This is not something she is ever going to get over.”
Ramos said she had to leave her home after Solomon’s death. So she had Solomon's body cremated and took his remains and her daughter Avery back to her father’s home in Baton Rouge, La.
“I just didn’t want to be in Georgia anymore,” Ramos said. “And I did not want to bury him and leave him in Georgia alone.”
Squires said Solomon was easy to become attached to.
“He had a beautiful heart,” she said. “When Solomon smiled, it was like he could cure anything.”
Solomon had turned 8 just a week before the shooting and was looking forward to starting second grade at Fairington Elementary School, Ramos said.
“He did well in school, he had friends everywhere, and he loved his little sister,” she said. “He was just a good kid.”
Oliver had been the same kind of good kid, Ross said, until his life took a bad turn.
Oliver's mother -- Ross’ daughter, Donna Renfroe -- was struggling with drug addiction when Oliver’s father died in April 2005 of a heart attack, Ross said.
Oliver was 10 and began acting out, she said.
“He lost all concern about school,” Ross said. “He began getting into trouble.”
Eventually, Oliver was kicked out of school and attended a Fulton alternative school. When he entered Westlake as a freshman, misbehavior problems showed up again.
That’s when Ramos stepped in.
“I was trying to get him into a DeKalb [County] school,” Ramos said. But then Solomon was killed.
“He made a terrible mistake, and Solomon’s gone,” Squires said. “He definitely should face some kind of punishment.”
Ramos said Oliver has apologized to her in a letter. And, despite the pain, she said she can forgive him.
“I’m still really angry with him,” Ramos said. “But I still do love him. ... I treated him like my own son.”
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